Haven’t read the gentleman’s book.
However, do you contest that there were less than 500,000 free blacks in 1860? That’s what the census says.
Of the total Union state population of roughly 25M, about 2.5M served in the military. The CSA percentage of service by white men was somewhat higher, but they had all those slaves to take up the slack on the home front.
Applying that same percentage to free blacks would give a total of less than 50,000 as potential recruits to the CSA. Since the considerable majority of free blacks lived in northern states, it is reasonable to assume most of them would have chosen to fight for the Union, even leaving out of the discussion the obvious racial politics and the fact that northern blacks wouldn’t have found it easy to even get to the CSA recruiting offices.
The other option for the CSA to come up with 100,000+ “volunteers” is that slaves served in the CSA, albeit in informal ways, since the CSA government quite carefully prohibited their serving legally until 1865.
Are you seriously contending that a black slave who traveled and fought with an Alabama regiment was a volunteer in any legitimate sense of the word? A slave, by definition, cannot be a volunteer.
I am, BTW, well aware of Forrest’s black scouts, although I’m unclear whether they were free or, if they were slaves, who “owned” them.
""However, do you contest-----" ===>YEP, i do, as the censuses of the 18th/19th centuries were AT BEST "educated guesses" & at worst, FRAUDULENT. may i offer the following evidence:
1. census "data" from 1890 stated that John Henry Barefoot & James Haley Barefoot (identical twins from Delaware County) were:
a. married to the SAME woman in 1890 & that BOTH men had six adult children with the same EXACT names &
b. John's wife is listed as a "spinster", even though she had been married to him for over 15 years & had had 3 sons & 4 daughters by him (the First Methodist Church office has the marriage certificate from 1874. = i happen to know about that particular bit of NONSENSE by the "enumerators" as a friend of mine is a descendant of John Barefoot & used his father's CSA service/pension record as proof to join the UDC.),
c.James was listed as a full-blood Seminole &
d.John was listed as a HALF-breed Cherokee! (fwiw, the twins were PROBABLY really Choctaw - nobody living is SURE, but they certainly were NOT of two different tribes! ===> note: there are MANY such RIDICULOUS claims in the 19th century censuses.)
2. at least three major genealogical societies (DAR, Aztec Club, UDC) that will NOT accept "family information" based on census data, absent REAL proof of the authenticity of the census information.
another comment that i've covered previously on these threads: the census of 1860 was SO BAD that, due to flooding of the Red & Trinity Rivers, the "census takers" said that NOBODY lived WEST of the Trinity. (can you say DALLAS & FT WORTH, children??? SURE, you can.)
next: (one more time!) slaves WERE NOT & COULD NOT be CS soldiers,sailors,marines. only FREE men could take the oath of enlistment (YES, SOME slaves were freed to enlist in the forces, but not nearly enough to make up a regiment, much less 100,ooo-150,ooo volunteers.). further, there are TENS OF THOUSANDS of CSA service records/pension records at the US Archives in DC & in many state archives as well (do you suggest that, like SOME DUMB-bunnies here do, that the US Archives are "in the hands of the neo-confederates" and/or that "somebody just went over & changed everything in the veterans files"?).
finally, MANY Black CSA veterans were active members of the United Confederate Veterans (do you believe that the WHITE members of the UCV would have accepted Black members, who were NOT really veterans??? OR, for that matter, that today's UDC/SCV would accept as members persons who are descendants of persons who did NOT serve???).
Sherman, the FACT is that you NEED to go to the archives with my friend & SEE for yourself what i'm talking about. then you won't have your "blinders on", as all too many of the LEFTIST/nit-witted/REVISIONIST/"useful idiots" of "the DAMNyankee coven" DO! (fwiw, i've offered numerous times to take off from work, go to the Archives with any/several of the DYs to show them the PROOF that they've been LIED TO, provided that they promised that, after i had done that, that they would come on FR & ADMIT the TRUTH, that they had seen with "their own eyes". NONE of the DYs want to KNOW the TRUTH and/or they want to HIDE the FACTS that prove that they are LYING! = fwiw, that is called: WILFUL IGNORANCE & intellectual DISHONESTY.)
free dixie,sw